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Usually I’m uncomfortable writing about family matters unless it’s about our dogs, and then I’m shameless.

This column isn’t about our beloved Jack Russell, Murphy, since departed but still mourned. Or the noble Golden Lab, Cobber, who died quietly in Washington, D.C., three months ago, several years after his “use before” date had expired.

No, this is about my son-in-law David Frum (whom I tend to refer to as “that nice David Frum”) and his new e-book Why Romney Lost: (and what the GOP can do about it).

It’s not quite accurate to say the book is courageous. But it certainly reflects considerable nerve on David’s part, and greater wisdom and perception than virtually any of his contemporaries on the U.S. political scene.

Incredibly, less than 48 hours after Barack Obama won the U.S. election, David’s e-book was available on Amazon Kindle for $3.99. The speed and daring of the book and its observations, projections and suggestions have startled and astounded the U.S. media as well as political junkies. It is No. 1 on Amazon’s e-book list.

True, he is a fast (and prolific) writer, but he started writing Why Romney Lost back in August, when conventional wisdom was that the ghastly U.S. economy and the utter lack of a record of achievements of the Obama administration, seemed to spell doom for the Democrats.

Their best hope was attack ads and the smearing of Mitt Romney as someone who wanted to help only the rich.

Rush Limbaugh, Karl Rove, Dick Morris, Fox News and acolytes seemed in the business of promoting the Republican presidential candidate regardless of any evidence to the contrary. After the first debate, Romney was seen as something of a sure winner. His race to lose.

The mainstream media tended to buy the theme. Me too, dependent as I was on printed and spoken analyses. Not David. He saw the election campaign differently.

He saw a Republican party that was increasingly out of touch with today’s reality.

A party that increasingly isolated itself, comprised of feuding parts: Evangelicals, Tea Partiers, Libertarians, rednecks, aging establishment conservatives. All white, all with only casual concern about appealing to blacks, Latinos and minority groups.

David has been railing — and warning — about Republican isolationism for close to a decade. His earlier books have urged the GOP to examine, or re-examine its policies. In the process, he became something of a Republican apostate — suspect and an outsider. Conservative, yes, but not trusted by the party elite. A sort of prophet-in-waiting.

He was bounced from his job at the American Enterprise Institute for being too moderate, so set up his own blog (FrumForum), which has since morphed into him writing for the Daily Beast and Newsweek.

Occasionally maligned, he was persona non grata at Fox News, but used by CNN as a commentator. He weathered criticism from the right and suspicions from the left. But remained true to his own judgment and values.

The immolation of Romney in the 2012 election was not Romney’s fault (to David he was by far the best man) but the result of GOP stagnation and misjudgment. It has become a white political party, excluding minorities — not from racist convictions, but from ignorance and failure to adapt.

The Cold War is over. Abortion, same-sex marriage, birth control are social, individual issues, which shouldn’t be incompatible with a conservative ideology. Liberals run up debts and deficits; conservatives live within their means. Liberals worry about mankind, conservatives are concerned about individuals.

Nearly 10 years ago, the late Bill Buckley recognized Frum as “the most refreshing ideological experience in a generation … reintroduces relish and perspective to political debate.”

Regardless, the 2012 election has proven David Frum right. His short, 80-page e-book Why Romney Lost is a “must read” for Republicans. If the GOP has any sense they’ll pay attention.

Frum represents the future — a voice of sensible conservatism, and the way to win back the White House.

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The tale of Toronto Sun founding editor Peter Worthington’s role in the escape of his interpreter from the Soviet Union in the 1960s is the stuff of legend. However, Worthington wanted to wait until all the protagonists — including himself — were dead before he told the story in complete detail. So here, for the first time in publication, is Part 2